[[link removed]]Dear John,





I don’t need to tell you how absurd and unhelpful it is for the details about targeted school, child care, and business closures to be announced in such a haphazard and illogical way. But I do want to do my best to make sure you have the information:

Here is the full list of school buildings that are closed [[link removed]] as of Thursday, 10/8. In our Council district, the schools that are closed are PS 130, PS 131, PS 179, PS 230, MS 839, Brooklyn College Academy, and West Brooklyn Community High School. Schools in the red and orange zones on the Governor’s hasty and confusing map [[link removed]] , are closed for at least two weeks starting Thursday, as are any schools in the yellow zone that had already been closed on Tuesday. All other schools in the yellow zone are open , with new weekly testing procedures coming soon. The DOE is hosting a forum for parents on COVID-19 testing in schools tonight at 6:30 pm , details here [[link removed]] , and you can sign up here [[link removed]] .

All of these schools have worked incredibly hard to show up to make in-person learning safe and possible for their students. I’ll be at P.S. 130/M.S. 839 this morning with a group of parents calling for more targeted closures based on school-specific testing data, as the DOE’s plan originally proposed, rather than vague maps. As the local elected officials said together yesterday, the schools in Kensington/Windsor Terrace are in a zip code (11218) where the positivity rate remains below 3%, and no cases have been reported in any of those schools. Public health data does not support their closure.

All sites will be reevaluated for reopening in two weeks (the earliest any impacted site would reopen is Wednesday, October 21) but no details have been provided about how decisions about reopenings will be made.

We are still trying to confirm, but it seems that DOE-contracted child care facilities (including the Learning Bridges Program) are closed within the red and orange zones, but that other DOHMH certified child care businesses are allowed to stay open. (If true, this is also arbitrary and infuriating, since it would mean that child care centers that went the extra mile to provide wrap-around and extended support for families would be the ones targeted for closure).

I’ll say it again, just to be clear: We need data-driven, targeted closures in COVID-19 hot-spots. But we need them to be done in a clear, well-communicated way, grounded in data, with unity between the City and the State. It is infuriating that the Governor and the Mayor have not been able to provide that.

The City has (to their credit, fairly rapidly) set up a helpful website where you can look up an address to see whether it falls in one of the zones with restrictions: nyc.gov/covidzone [[link removed]] .

My office is continuing to work to get clarity and address specific issues in our district, don’t hesitate to be in touch if we can be helpful.

Last, but certainly not least: I am deeply alarmed by the violence against dissenters and journalists during protests against targeted COVID-19 closures the last two nights in Borough Park. Last night, protestors surrounded and penned-in an FDNY fire truck that had come to put out a fire started by people burning masks, and they physically assaulted Jacob Kornbluh, a Orthodox Jewish journalist who has courageously supported social distancing and public health policies [[link removed]] . I have and will continue to talk with community leaders to try to support those who are speaking up for following public health guidance, stressing the Jewish value of pikuach nefesh – saving a life [[link removed]] .

We will keep you updated as we learn more.

Brad

456 Fifth Avenue, 3rd Floor
Brooklyn, NY 11215
718-499-1090
[email protected]

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